Just thought I'd let everyone know that there's only one chapter to go after this one. The end is very near folks.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN: BURYING THE PAST
It was still early when Harry headed up to the seventh year boys' dorm after Quidditch practice one night. Ron was the only one up there. He was sitting on his bed, seemingly absorbed in the piece of parchment he was holding in his hands. He looked upset.
"What is it?" Harry asked him.
Ron must have not heard him enter the room because he looked up startled, and quickly muttered, "nothing," before stuffing the parchment in his robes.
He wasn't getting off that easy. "It's not nothing. It looks like you've just seen your on death,"
"Drop it, Harry, would you?" He said, irritated.
"Ron, I just – "
"I'm not going to graduate," he blurted out. "Are you happy now?"
Harry gave him a look that was a cross between bewilderment and shock, and Ron thrusted the piece of parchment into his hands.
It was written by Professor McGonagall, informing Ron that his marks were substandard and that he was in danger of not graduating with the rest of the seventh years in June if he did not achieve drastic improvements over the next little while. She proceeded to list his averages in each of his subjects, before ending off the later by saying she wanted to see him that night in her office to discuss the situation.
Harry had to fight to keep his mouth from hanging open as he stared down at Ron's grades. Harry had known he had been struggling a bit with some of his classes – but so were a lot of people. Seventh year had turned out to be beyond any challenge they had anticipated. Ron was failing several of his classes, and the ones he was passing were not by much.
"How did this happen?"
Ron shrugged. "I stopped doing the homework, failed a couple of tests…" he trailed off, figuring he didn't need to say anything more.
"Ron, this is bad,"
"Thanks for that brilliant bit of insight, Harry, because the thought had never even occurred to me," he remarked sarcastically, snatching the parchment out of Harry's hands.
"What are you going to do?"
"I don't know,"
Harry frowned. He didn't sound overly considered about it. "Ron, you have to do something. There's only a few months 'til graduation,"
"Then what's the point?" Ron said bitterly. "I could spend every waking hour studying my brains out and still not scrape together enough NEWTS to graduate,"
It struck Harry then what he was saying. "So you're just giving up?"
"It's not giving up if you're already doomed to fail," Ron said before leaving the room.
"I need to ask you something,"
Hermione looked up from her advanced arithmancy essay to see a very anxious expression on Harry's face. It must have been important if he had come all the way down the library to talk to her.
"What is it, Harry? You look horrible,"
He sat down on the bench across from her. "Just hear me out before you make any decisions, okay?"
"Okay," she said, not sure what was going on.
"What if there was a student in danger of not passing their seventh year?"
That didn't come as much of a shock to her. It was common knowledge many of the students in their year were struggling to keep passing grades. "How bad is it?"
"Pretty bad," Harry told her. "Would you be willing to tutor this person?"
"I don't know, Harry," she said,carefully thinking it over. "It sounds like this person needs more help then even I can give them. Plus, I've got enough work of my own to do. I have so many assignments to finish I haven't even started revising for our NEWTS yet,"
"Hermione, you're the smartest person in our year. If anybody can help someone pass it's you,"
She heaved a sigh and gave in. "All right. Fine, I'll do it. But," she added in a tone that said she was only going to agree to this on her terms, "if it interferes with my own schoolwork, I'm stopping,"
Harry nodded. "Fair enough,"
"Who is it?"
She saw him shift uncomfortably and say in a barely audible voice, "Ron,"
"That's not fair," she accused. "You should have told me it was him from the beginning. I agreed to help a student in need, not Ron,"
It was all she could do to keep herself from hurtling her arithmancy textbook at him. She expected more from Harry then to deceive her in to agreeing to something he knew she would have said no to if he had been honest with her from the start.
"Hermione, he needs you," Harry insisted. "You're the only one that can help him. I know you don't owe him anything and a few months ago I wouldn't have cared if Ron passed or failed, but he's still my best friend despite everything he's done – and he used to be yours. It might make you feel less guilty about what happened with us,"
She didn't throw her textbook at him that time but she did slam it shut with such force that a stir of heads turned to look in their direction. "That was really rotten, Harry," she hissed at him, trying to keep her voice low enough so no one else would hear her. "I can't believe you would use that to try and get me to help him. Just because your conscience needs easing doesn't mean mine does too,"
She was right about that part. Since he and Ron had begun working things out, he had found it difficult to not feel like he had betrayed him in some way. He felt the same way with Ginny. They had patched things up awhile back, and she still had no idea of his brief relationship with Hermione. If he could help it, she never would.
"I'm sorry," he apologized, knowing he had been out of line to say that. "I just don't want to see Ron mess up his whole life because he's too stubborn to ask for help. He's thinking about dropping out,"
She wanted more than anything at that moment to not care about Harry's last words. But she did – and Harry could tell that she did.
"I know he's not your problem," Harry continued, "and I would never ask you to forgive him. All I'm asking is that you think about it before coming to any decisions. Ron may not deserve your help, but he needs it,"
She didn't want to think about it. She wanted to tell him "no" right then and there. But she didn't. Her essay lay forgotten because all she did after Harry had gone was think about it.
When Hermione came to, she barely had the strength to keep her eyes open. The only thing that kept her from closing them again was the person sitting next to her.
Ron looked an absolute mess. He looked like he hadn't shaved in days and the dark circles under his eyes showed he probably hadn't slept much in that time either.
He gave her hand a squeeze. "Welcome back,"
"You look awful," she said weakly.
He flashed her a tired grin. "You don't look so hot yourself,"
"What happened?"
He looked concerned that she didn't remember. "You were in an accident. Your car – " he broke off and shook his head. "Well, there's not much left of it,"
It started coming back to her in bits and pieces then. Her distracted state of mind after leaving the Weasleys; the bad road conditions; spinning out of control and then crashing into a telephone pole. "How long have I been unconscious?"
"A week,"
She nearly croaked. "A week?"
He nodded gravely. "They said you had some pretty severe head trauma. They weren't sure if you were going to make it for awhile. We thought about bringing you to St. Mungo's but the doctors we spoke with there said there was nothing they could do for you that the muggles weren't already doing,"
She looked down at the hand that was resting on hers and noticed there was no longer an engagement ring on it.
Ron saw where she was looking. "It didn't happen," he told her. "I couldn't go through with it when I found out you were in here. It was my fault after all,"
"You didn't force me to drive. I should have listened to Harry,"
She didn't miss the way his face contorted when she mentioned Harry's name. "What happened between me and Harry was a long time ago," she began carefully, not wanting a repeat of that night at The Burrow. "I knew how you would react, that's why I could never tell you. And as the years went by, it didn't seem to matter anymore, at least not to me,"
"Well, it matters to me," said Ron. "If it didn't mean anything, why couldn't you have told me? I would have – "
"Understood?" She cut in. He seemed to sink back in his chair, and said nothing. She noticed how he had let go of her hand. "Ron, you and I both know it wouldn't have made a difference if Harry and I had waited a hundred years to tell you. You still would have reacted the same way." She paused before finally working up the courage to say, "if you hadn't found out that night I don't think I would have ever told you,"
"Harry could have had anyone he wanted at Hogwarts, why did it have to be you?" He had spoken the words aloud, but he didn't seem to be speaking to her when he said them.
"Ron, you have to understand something. Harry means a lot to me – I love him – but my feelings for him do not go beyond friendship,"
"But they did at one time?"
He wasn't going to let this go. He couldn't let it go. "Whatever I may have felt for Harry at the time, it wasn't love. There's only one person I've ever loved,"
His eyes seemed to widen at that, but he was silent. He didn't seem to know what else to say.
"If you want me, you and Harry to have anything remotely resembling a friendship, you're going to have to let this go," she said gently.
"I know that," he said with a sigh. "But you don't know what it was like for me to walk in and see you in bed with Harry after everything we had said to each other. I didn't think there had been a worse moment in my life, but I was wrong,"
He was referring to finding out about her time spent with Harry at Hogwarts. "What do you want me to do, Ron? Spend the rest of my days apologizing to you for going to Harry because I was lonely,"
"Of course not," he answered, though his tone was not entirely convincing.
"What then?"
"I don't know,"
She couldn't do this with him right now. Maybe in a few days when they both had time to think, things might be different. "I think you should leave,"
That got his attention.
"Why?"
She had forgotten how dense he could be. "Because I don't want to fight with you, and that's exactly where this conversation is leading if one of us doesn't leave. And since it can't be me, you're the next obvious choice,"
"I can't," he said slowly. "I love you and I'm not going anywhere until we fix this,"
It came as some what of a shock to hear him say that after everything that had happened. "What about you and Gillian?" She asked him.
"It's over," he said simply. "She didn't want to postpone the wedding, and it didn't seem right to marry her when you were lying in here, unconscious,"
"I'm sorry," she said quietly.
"I'm an idiot," was his response. "As crazy as it's going to sound, if you hadn't got into that accident, I would have married Gillian – and the only reason would have been because I was angry with you." Shaking his head and chuckling slightly, he said, "we haven't changed a bit, have we? You had to almost die for me to realize what a mistake I was making,"
"You weren't the only idiot," she said to him. "So how do we get ourselves out of this mess we've made?" Then she added, "I'm not even sure that we can,"
"We can," he said in an unwaveringly tone. "But you're going to have to trust me,"
She didn't find out just what he had in mind until she was released from the hospital a week later.
It was after dark when Hermione ventured outside the great castle. As it turned out she wasn't the only one in need of some fresh air. Approaching the castle with their broomsticks slung over their shoulders were Dean, Seamus and Ron, probably on their way back from a quick pickup game of Quidditch.
She had learned from Ginny that Ron had become quite good friends with them during the period when Harry wasn't speaking to him. That didn't seem to have changed even after he and Harry had gotten back on speaking terms.
Hermione didn't have to say anything when they approached her. Ron took one look at her face before telling Dean and Seamus that he'd meet them back in the common room. Even when they were gone it was nearly a full minute either one of them spoke.
"Is everything all right?" Ron asked, breaking the silence.
It was the first words he'd spoken to her since that day in the hospital wing almost four months ago.
"What makes you think there's something wrong?"
"Well, for starters, you're wondering out here alone… and you're talking to me,"
"Nothing's wrong with me. I didn't even expect to find you out here," she lied. "I would have thought you'd be in the library catching up on work,"
Ron looked about ready to slam his broom handle on the ground. "Goddamn, Harry Potter," he growled. "He told you, didn't he?"
"He wants to make sure you graduate," she said carefully, not wanting to unleash his temper.
"Why? It's not like I deserve it,"
"Ron, you wouldn't have gotten this far if you didn't deserve it,"
This time he did slam his broom on the ground. "The only reason I got this far is because of you. I spent six years begging you to let me copy your work, and when you would refuse you would offer to help me understand it instead. So you see, Ron Weasley is nothing if he doesn't have Hermione Granger at his side every minute of the day, grounding the importance of doing well in school into his head,"
"So you're just going to give up and drop out?"
He was really going to give it to Harry for telling her that. "You tell me what the point is of continuing on when we both know I'm as stupid as a troll when it comes to all this school rubbish,"
"I could help you," she said slowly.
"No," he responded immediately. "If there's one person I don't want helping me, it's you,"
She was stunned by this, and couldn't help but feel a little hurt, despite everything that had happened between then. "Ron, I'm the only person who can,"
"I don't care!" he yelled at her. "You've already wasted enough time on me. Luckily, in a few months you'll be out of here and will probably never have look at me again,"
"I never thought I wasted time on you, and I'm not wasting my time by telling you I want to help. But if you're too stubborn and thick-headed to see it, then you are right, I am wasting my time," she said, raising her voice to match his. "So you might as well march down to McGonagall's office right now and tell her your dropping out,"
He seemed to consider that before finally saying, "you don't owe me anything, Hermione,"
"I know,"
"It won't work, you know," he said, making one last attempt to get her to change her mind.
"We won't know that until you let me try,"
He still looked ready to disagree with her, but she had that determined look on her face that he had seen so many times before and that was the only reason he agreed to it in the end.